Summary

This Recommendation | International
Standard represents an evolution of the existing video coding standards
(H.261, H.262, and H.263) and it was developed in response to the growing
need for higher compression of moving pictures for various applications such
as videoconferencing, digital storage media, television broadcasting,
Internet streaming, and communication. It is also designed to enable the use
of the coded video representation in a flexible manner for a wide variety of
network environments. The use of this Recommendation | International Standard
allows motion video to be manipulated as a form of computer data and to be
stored on various storage media, transmitted and received over existing and
future networks and distributed on existing and future broadcasting channels.

The revision approved 2005-03 contained
modifications of the video coding standard to add four new profiles, referred
to as the High, High 10, High 4:2:2, and High 4:4:4 profiles, to improve video
quality capability and to extend the range of applications addressed by the
standard (for example, by including support for a greater range of picture
sample precision and higher-resolution chroma formats). Additionally, a
definition of new types of supplemental data was specified to further broaden
the applicability of the video coding standard. Finally, a number of
corrections to errors in the published text were included.

Corrigendum 1 to ITU-T Rec. H.264
corrected and updated various minor aspects to bring the ITU-T version of the
text up to date relative to the April 2005 output status approved as a new
edition of the corresponding jointly-developed and technically-aligned text
ISO/IEC 14496-10. It additionally fixed a number of minor errors and needs
for clarification and defined three previously-reserved sample aspect ratio
indicators.

Amendment 1 "Support of additional
colour spaces and removal of the High 4:4:4 Profile" contained
alterations to ITU‑T Rec. H.264 | ISO/IEC 14496‑10
Advanced Video Coding to specify the support of additional colour spaces and
to remove the definition of the High 4:4:4 Profile.

NOTE – ITU-T Rec. H.264 is a twin
text with ISO/IEC 14496‑10 and this amendment was published in two
different documents in the ISO/IEC series:

– The removal of the High 4:4:4 profile was
found in ISO/IEC 14496-10:2005/Cor.2.

– The specification for support of additional
colour spaces was found in ISO/IEC 14496-10:2005/Amd.1.

Amendment 2 "New profiles for
professional applications" contained extensions to ITU-T Rec. H.264
| ISO/IEC 14496‑10 Advanced Video Coding to specify the support of
five additional profiles intended primarily for professional applications
(the High 10 Intra, High 4:2:2 Intra,
High 4:4:4 Intra, CAVLC 4:4:4 Intra, and High 4:4:4
Predictive profiles) and two new types of supplemental enhancement
information (SEI) messages (the post-filter hint SEI message and the tone
mapping information SEI message).

The H.264 edition published in 2005-11
included the text approved 2005-03 and its Corrigendum 1 approved 2005-09.
H.264 (2005) Amd.2 (2007) was available only as pre-published text since it
was superseded by H.264 Amd.3 (2007-11) before its publication; further,
H.264 Amd.3 was not published separately. This third edition integrated into
the H.264 edition published in 2005-11 all changes approved in Amendments 1
(2006-06), 2 (2007-04) and 3 (2007-11).

Corrigendum 1 (2009) provides a
significant number of minor corrections, clarifications, consistency
improvements and formatting improvements drafted in response to accumulated
errata reports collected since publication of the 2nd edition (dated 2005-03,
which included a Cor.1 approved 2005-09).

The H.264 edition published in 2009-05 contained
enhancement extensions to support multiview video coding (MVC), specification
of a "Constrained Baseline Profile", and some miscellaneous
corrections and clarifications.

This revision
to ITU-T Rec. H.264 contains the specification of a new profile (the Stereo
High profile) for two-view video coding with support of interlaced coding
tools, the specification a new SEI message (the frame packing arrangement SEI
message), and some miscellaneous corrections and clarifications.